


vanish

by athletiger



Series: the ironclad winter soldier [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Hurt, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-10-03 10:19:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17282225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/athletiger/pseuds/athletiger
Summary: God, Steve berated himself. He should have checked whether Tony was safe. Even though he had other priorities at the time, he shouldn’t have left him in the god-forsaken bunker. Now, Bucky’s under cyro treatment, he’s in hiding and on the run from Ross, and Tony. God, Tony’s missing. His voice is thick in his throat when he says weakly, “We should go to Siberia, see if we can help with the search and rescue.”





	vanish

**Author's Note:**

> This is for prompt fill of HC Bingo: disappearing.
> 
> Beta'ed by [demigodscum](https://archiveofourown.org/users/demigodscum).

“Tony’s missing,” Natasha says as soon as she walks into the room.

The resulting effect is instantaneous. Everyone present snaps to face her in some form of shock or calm. “Come again?” Steve breathes, almost barely, disbelieving his ears. But Natasha gives him a look.

“You heard me right the first time.”

“How do you know for sure?” Sam asks. “He could just be hunkered down in his workshop like he usually does, binge-working on new projects.”

“Because I stopped by the Compound and he wasn’t there,” Natasha replies, to which Sam interrupted with “You went back to the Compound? Are you crazy?” “It was fine," Natasha replies, "FRIDAY didn’t notice me, and I needed to keep tabs just in case. Pepper’s worried, Rhodes has been on the phone with Ross. Apparently he’s been missing for a week; no one’s seen him since his visit to the Raft.”

Steve ducks his head, feeling guilty. “Siberia,” he whispers. “We saw him in Siberia.”

“What’s in Siberia?” Sam inquires. “Isn’t it just wind and snow?”

“No, there’s also a HYDRA bunker located there,” Natasha said. “But it’s been unused for a long time.”

“They were storing other Winter Soldiers there, people like Bucky.” Steve felt sick. “Tony wanted to talk, to make things right, but things got out of hand when he found out that Bucky killed his parents. I left him there because I needed to care Bucky.”

God, Steve berated himself. He should have checked whether Tony was safe. Even though he had other priorities at the time, he shouldn’t have left him in the god-forsaken bunker. Now, Bucky’s under cyro treatment, he’s in hiding and on the run from Ross, and Tony. God, Tony’s missing. His voice is thick in his throat when he says weakly, “We should go to Siberia, see if we can help with the search and rescue.”

“Are you kidding me?” Sam says. “Stark hurt you and Bucky, branded Natasha as a traitor, and you still want to help him?”

Steve nods. “He’s still Tony, and we don’t forsake teammates, no matter if they forsook us.”

Sam slumps back in his chair. “Fine. We go to Siberia, check that he’s okay, and we book it out of there. I don’t trust him; I still think he’s pulling our leg.”

“Even if he’s setting a trap for us,” Natasha argues, “We can outsmart them. He’s only one, we’re three.”

“But he has Ross and his entire force,” Sam counters. “If we go there, we could go back to the Raft, and this time we won’t be able to escape.”

“We’ll go,” Steve decides. “We’ll be quick. It would take a while to mobilize their troops, and it’s just the three of us.”

“Fine,” Sam grumbles.

-

The bunker is a blackened wreck, its concrete walls stained in ash. Snow has settled into every available surface, piling its solid matter with pristine whiteness. Natasha brushes away some of the snow with her foot. If Steve closes his eyes, he could imagine the explosion that rocked this building, sending smoke into the cold night sky.

Fuck, and he left Tony here.

“There hasn’t been anyone here,” Natasha remarks, bending down to pull out a piece of melted glass from the floor of the bunker. Steve walks towards the place where the fight had happened, out where the Siberian cold air could slip in through the gaps of the bunker pillars, where only a light dust of snow covered the ground. The fire didn’t burn here, so all the signs of the fight are still there.

“We fought here,” Steve mutters lowly, looking down at the ground and seeing dried blood caked on the floor. Whose, he doesn’t know. It could be any of them. “I tried to stop him from killing Bucky.”

Towards one of the pillars was a pool of dried blood, nearly too much. Sam bends down to inspect it. “Is this Tony’s blood?” he asks, still eying it.

Steve shrugs. “Maybe, I’m not sure. I was focused on getting Bucky out of here.”

“You guys weren’t bad off when you landed in Wakanda,” Natasha comments, bending down beside Sam. “Look, there’s an anomaly in this pattern of blood. It leads…” Natasha looks over and brushes away another layer of snow. There’s a blood pattern that is moving away from the pool of blood.

“Someone was here and took Tony,” Natasha says, standing up and following the dried blood trail. It stops just at the edge of the derelict bunker. “We don’t know who.”

Steve sits down heavily onto the floor, ignoring the cold seeping into his bones. He feels more lonely than ever, with his two closest friends gone.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm chanting to myself that I'm going to get to the Stony part. _sigh_


End file.
